Jorge Luis Guzman

Jorge Luis Guzman (1873-1920) was a Mexican general and politician who was the founder of the Mexican Proletariat Society (Sociedad Proletariado Mexicano). He was a communist inspired by Karl Marx, and was killed during the Mexican Revolution.

Biography
Guzman was born in Jalisco to a silver mining family. His father Juan Pablo Guzman was a former soldier in the Mexican Army who was sent to work in the silver mines for stealing weapons to sell in the black market; his mother Carlota Sanchez was sent to a silver mine for adultery. He was born with a sense of injustice, as his family showed him the effect of the rich politicians on the poor. Guzman read "The Communist Manifesto" of Karl Marx, published in 1848, and was inspired by the preaching of a perfect world in which the middle class would be abolished and the workers would have a "dictatorship of the proletariat".

In 1903 Guzman was elected as the Governor of Jalisco after a series of publications of works such as "Manifesto Comunista" (a translation of Marx's works), "Libertad Para Todos" ("Freedom for All", detailing his views on communism), and various ballads. He used communism's prinicples to rule the people and eventually rebelled against the government in 1907; it would last until the 1920s, with its height being in the first three years. In 1911, with the broader Mexican Revolution, Guzman advocated the support of Abraham Reyes at first, but after Reyes planned to install an autocracy, Guzman instead fought against him as the leader of the communist party.

He allied with Emiliano Zapata because they shared similar beliefs; he also made a leader out of former Chiapas politican Emmanuel Zaragoza. The Zapatistas were defeated in 1918 and Zapata killed; Guzman eventually laid down his arms to Alvaro Obregon's government. Guzman was still a threat and his rebels still fought a small guerrilla war, and he was brought to an execution cell in Mexico City and shot in 1920.